


In Your Skin

by Atrashbearthattrashes



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon Divergence - Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Korg - Freeform, Original Character(s), POV Loki (Marvel), Post-Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Sassy Loki (Marvel), Slow Burn, Slow Romance, Thor - Freeform, Trickster Gods
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-10
Updated: 2019-04-03
Packaged: 2019-09-15 14:12:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 14,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16934739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Atrashbearthattrashes/pseuds/Atrashbearthattrashes
Summary: The angular face of a man swims into her line of vision, and though her eyesight’s blinded, she can still make out the disdain in his gaze as he peers down at her.“Debauching already, Half-Blood?”Five thousands refugees on this ship, and fate sends her the one most likely to enjoy watching her die.“Hello, Laufeyson. Come to finally kill me?”





	1. Chapter 1

_Largest getaway ship in the Nine Realms,_ Lyra thinks, _and not a damned medical supply in sight._  
  
Oh, sure — there are _things_ on this cruiser she’s found herself pillaging: bottles and tissues and, true to Sakkaran form, the largest bulk supply of condoms she’s ever seen.    
  
“GrandMasters, TM!", they’d squeaked when she’d accidentally bumped into a crate. “For Every Grand Scepter!” Neon fireworks had erupted over her shoes in ecstatic convulsion, and if she hadn’t been so preoccupied, she’d’ve set the entire thing on fire, if only to see the Elder’s leering mug on each packet melt into the wrinkled old maw she knows must lie beneath that millenia-old smile.  
  
But she won’t, because she needs to keep searching.  And she can’t, because — well, it’s getting harder to breathe.  
  
Lyra thumps her head against the wall, counting the erratic beats of her pulse. It’s been 12 hours since she’s had her last shot; 24 since she’s lost the medicine she needs to live.  
  
Had she not been guiding screaming children and frail elders onto the ship to escape Hela’s wrath, she might have thought about grabbing her supplies. Had a giant demon Helspawn not destroyed her planet in a spectacular conflagration, she might have even had time to pack some.  
  
And if the Prince — _the Prince,_ she sneers, hadn't swaggered onto the Bifrost, his band of gladiatorial rejects stampeding through the supplies as they’d knocked through his sister’s death army — she might have been able to save the meager things they’d managed to bring up from the keep.  
  
But he had, and she hadn’t, so she’d done nothing but watch as her precious meds had plunged over the rainbow bridge when Sutur had struck, any remaining hope of survival along with it.  
  
Korg, who had rocks for brains, had at least had the decency to act contrite. He’d given her an apologetic look before bowling Miek straight into a group of undead.  
  
But Asgard’s Crown Prince — voice dripping with self-admiration as he’d announced his arrival — had barely paused to take in the wreckage, flipping his daggers as he stalked past Lyra, declaring _“you’re welcome”_ , as if saving her from an instantaneous death was preferable to the slow one that now awaited.  
  
Lyra glances at the clock. Only a few minutes left. If she’s lucky, she’ll pass out before her heart stops and she slips quietly into Valhalla’s hold.

_Norns be damned._ She’s not going down like this. Not catatonic, half-passed out on an orgy ship with enough condoms to supply the armies of the nine realms.  
  
Desperate, she yanks out drawers, searching for anything — _anything_ —  
  
A flash catches her eye; she pulls, hard —  
  
As the ship suddenly nose-dives, tilting the room 90 degrees, and it’s only halfway down that Lyra realizes it’s not the ship tilting but _her_ , and _Gods_ , the drawer comes flying out, the ceiling above her darkening with the ominous portent of the contents inside. They hover in the air momentarily like some ancient, foreboding plague. Then, they crash down, and Lyra has to cover her face to avoid the torrent of gleeful fireworks that explode around her as a mountainous horde of GrandMasters, TM rains down on her like some unholy alien abstinence campaign.  
  
It takes her a moment to catch her breath.

Then, she bursts out laughing.  
  
She laughs to loosen the pit of fear in her guts; laughs because she’s buried under a pile of packets she won’t ever use; laughs because she’s going to die on the floor of this orgy ship, all because the Sakkarans can’t keep it in their pants and the prince’s hard-on for power has truly and finally fucked her.  
  
She’s still laughing when a heavy black boot plants itself next to her head. The angular face of a man swims into her line of vision, and though she's blinded by the foil, she can still make out the disdain in his gaze as he peers down at her.  
  
“Debauching already, Half-Blood?”  
  
This just makes her laugh harder. Five thousands refugees on this ship, and fate sends her the one most likely to enjoy watching her die.  
  
“Hello, Laufeyson. Come to finally kill me?”


	2. Chapter 2

Loki’s mouth thins, but he says nothing.  
  
He has no cause to harm the woman, especially given her state. Lying on the floor of this disgusting ship is hardly where someone would choose to be — let alone buried under — he leans in — Gods, were those _fireworks_?  
  
“I’m generally not in the habit of killing people I’ve saved,” he says dryly, shuffling a few sputtering packets aside with his boot. “And having one of the few remaining survivors of Asgard die on me now would be rather anticlimactic.”  
  
Especially, he notes as he studies her, one whose only error was bearing the weight of an unfortunate ancestry.  
  
The woman — _Lyra,_ his mind supplies — was half-mortal, if memory served — a product of some rumored Midgardian tryst. As a child, he’d heard whispers of a half-blood come to live among the Aesir, and he’d managed to observe her the few times she’d come to the palace. She’d been a rambunctious thing then; all shouts and play fights and skinned knees — a perfect addition to Thor’s raucous group. Utterly oblivious to the quiet boy who had watched her from behind the spine of his large books.  
  
She hasn't changed much, Loki notes. There’s still a glint in her eye that hints at a sharp mind and even sharper tongue, and volumes of riotous hair that give the impression of her being perpetually caught in the wind.  
  
Out of habit, he sweeps over her form, searching for weapons. There’s a small, wicked blade nestled between the valley of her breasts, and an empty bandolier slung low around the curve of wide hips. She’s shapelier than the average mortal; resembling little of the rail-thin waifs that had once listlessly drifted through Asgard’s halls; and nothing like the Grandmaster’s robotic playthings, who had served as a passing amusement at best on Sakaar, and at worst, a way to divert the madman’s unwanted advances.  
  
Loki clears his throat. “Besides, watching you die isn’t nearly as fun as watching your attempt at…whatever this is.”  
  
“His Excellency can’t be bored already,” Lyra replies solicitously. She turns, face still flat against the floor’s grate, and it’s only because she can’t see him that her mouth runs off before she can stop it. “Surely, there’s a mutiny that needs plotting? A planetary invasion now that we have no home?”  
  
His mouth thins into a cold smile. “Bold thing, aren’t you?”  
  
“You tend to dispense with niceties when on the edge of death.”  
  
“In need of help, then?”  
  
“If you could find Eir,” she says through gritted teeth. “I’d be grateful.”  
  
“Eir is overwhelmed. What do you need?”  
  
At that, her eyes land on him. Large and sharp, they cast a slow, assessing look over his tall form.  “I’ll wait,” she says finally.  
  
“You’ll sooner die.”  
  
“Let it be, then.”  
  
His eyebrows shoot up. “You would sooner risk death than accept my help?”  
  
“Everyone knows you are unparalleled in magic, your Highness. It is your trustworthiness I question.”  
  
“Your faith in me is touching. If I’d wanted to kill you, I would have done it the moment I saw you on the floor, curled in on yourself like an insect evading a boot.”  
  
“And they call him Silvertongue,” she deadpans, but rolls to face him nonetheless, opening her fist to reveal a small vial in her hand. “I need to inject it. Can you fashion a syringe?”  
  
Loki crouches, taking the small glass in hand. It is a fragile thing, easily breakable. Not unlike the woman next to him. As if reading his mind, her eyebrow cocks in defiance, daring him to make the comparison.  
  
Instead, he surveys the lab, searching for an object to transmute. He pulls open drawers, pausing briefly at the variety of contraceptives that greet him — and _oh, what variety there is_ — before spying splints in the cabinet above. Removing one, he recalls what he can of Midgardian medicine, conjuring the tool to the best of his ability, and knows he’s done well when Lyra’s eyes light up with recognition.  
  
“Thank you,” she says, and Loki idly wonders how long it’s been since someone thanked him so easily, without guile or pretense.  
  
Certainly, the masses had been grateful when he’d arrived with the ship. But one heroic act did little to outweigh years of deceit on the throne. He sees it, in the way they eye him suspiciously in the halls; in the way Thor steps a little closer to him during security council meetings, as if to silently reassure the rest that he belongs. They’d instantly bent the knee to his brother once he’d returned; no question as to who the rightful heir to Asgard’s tattered remains had been.  
  
He’s dragged from his bitter thoughts by the sight of Lyra plunging the needle into her arm.

Loki watches the woman's eyes drift shut, neck arched like a swan in flight as her ragged breaths slow to a quiet sigh. The bow of her lush mouth falls opens, breathing in life-affirming air; her flushed skin cooling as droplets of sweat glide down over delicate collarbone to disappear into the shadowed cleft of her breasts.

 _Too long,_ Loki laments. _I've been on this godforsaken ship too long._  
  
At length, her eyes open. She pockets the syringe, and slowly turns to stare at him.

He feels his irritation rising. She's eyeing him with an arrogance no one with her lifespan has business exuding.

 _“What?”_ he grinds out.  
  
Her eyes drop to his chest.  
  
It’s only then that Loki looks down and remembers the large, violent gash torn clean through him.  
  
“Ah, yes,” he says lightly. “That.”


	3. Chapter 3

Lyra watches an almost embarrassed expression cross the trickster’s face.  
  
She’d been so caught up in her own pain that she’d failed to realize that he was bleeding — and profusely at that. His dark leathers have disguised it well, but with her vision now clear, she sees that the wound is deep, and that his leathers are dark not because of their color, but because the blood has soaked them through.  
  
Impulsively, she reaches for him. “Let me — “  
  
_“Don’t.”_  
  
His tone is raw; green eyes swirling with a mixture of anger, bitterness and beneath it all, fear.    
  
“I’m sorry,” she says, stepping back. “I didn’t — ”  
  
But he’s already moving, anger replaced by determination as he strides across the lab. Lyra can’t help but observe him, his long, tall form a study in elegance, graceful movements underpinned by a raw, manic power as he rummages through supplies.  
  
He finds what he’s looking for — a small, metallic disc — and holds it up to his chest, allowing a few drops of blood to spill onto its surface. It lights up instantly, spinning and whirling in a laser-light spectacle as it calculates.  
  
It beeps after a moment. “Specimen not recognized!” A robotic voice chirps.  
  
“Damn,” Loki says mildly.  And with that, he _hurls_ the disc across the room with such fury that it shatters against the wall, evaporating into dust with a stuttering bang.  
   
He braces himself against the counter, and for a moment, Lyra sees his unfettered rage.  
  
Then just as quickly, it’s gone, replaced by a pensive expression.  
  
Her eyes dart from the wall to his chest. “You’re still bleeding, in case you were curious.”  
  
He waves a hand dismissively, the wound disappearing within seconds, and Lyra gapes. _Eir be damned!_ If this was how the Trickster worked, she’d take his ability over the healer’s any day. (Though his tendency to go from mild-mannered to sociopath in seconds left something to be desired.)  
  
“What does it do?”  
  
“What?” she says, still distracted by his newly healed chest.  
  
“The serum you take,” he says impatiently. “What does it do?”  
  
“Regulates blood,” she says vaguely, avoiding his gaze, and nods to the broken disc to avoid further questions. “What about that?”  
  
He waves a hand. “A test. Nothing more.”  
  
“DNA test?” She presses. “Surely you know your heritage, if the plays are to be believed. A — what was it — battle token?”  
  
“War prize,” he supplies dryly.  
  
“Right. War prize, outcast, hero, baby blue icicle. Heritage enough, don’t you think?”  
  
“If I were still King,” he says darkly, “I would sentence you to hang.”  
  
“Mh-hm. So?”  
  
For a moment, he considers lying to her. Brush off her speculation with a subtle misdirect. But her gaze is open, her large eyes tracing his features with such genuine curiosity that he finds himself speaking before he even knows it. “My inquiry is fueled by a tragically pragmatic need.”  
  
Idly, he watches several Asgardians walk past the bay doors, and it hits her.  “You want to know if you have another home.”  
  
“Midgard is a nightmare I do not wish to revisit.”  
  
She frowns. “We’re not terrible, you know. Only short-lived.”  
  
He nods, avoiding her gaze. There’s something more. Something he's reluctant to say. She watches his eyes stray once again to the people beyond the bay doors, eyes lingering for the briefest moment on a child that’s fallen asleep in its father’s arms.  
  
“Children,” she says softly, the source of his rage suddenly clear. “You want to know if your blood is compatible with other races.”  
  
“If there is a place other than Earth to build a legacy, I would gladly take it,” he says softly.  
  
“You don’t think you have legacy enough?”  
  
His eyes slide to hers, a warning in them. “Perhaps I seek one without dysfunction, Half-Blood.”  
  
His words cause something to snap inside of her, and Lyra pulls out the makeshift syringe before she knows what she’s doing.  
  
“ _This_ — “ she says, shoving the instrument at Loki —  “When your body can’t survive on its own — _this_ is dysfunction. When you can’t plan six months ahead, a year, ten — _that’s_ not having a legacy. You have lived for millennia; you have conquered Asgard’s throne. You’re a sorcerer of the highest order and a demigod at that. Disadvantaged as you may think you are, your Highness, your lot in life is not to be defined by your blood.”  
  
He’s on her in a flash. Hand at her throat as he pushes her to the wall, quiet fury blazing beneath his cold gaze. ”What, then, if not my blood?” he sneers. “My achievements? My _name?_ ” His thumb pushes into the delicate arch of her windpipe, feeling the blood jump furiously beneath his hand. “What is it you think _defines_ me?”  
  
It takes her a moment to realize she’s not suffocating. One hand digs into her hip, the weight of his deceptively light form fully pressed against her, blood-soaked leather seeping into the light muslin of her shirt. The other hand is wrapped around her neck, the fingers she thought would crush her splayed along her throat instead, tilting her face up towards his; as if his words alone aren’t enough to wrest an answer.  
  
She eyes him evenly. “Choice.”  
  
“Choice? What choice is there in this?” he snarls.  
  
Lyra sees the desperation behind his artfully constructed mask, the raw desire for an answer that he knows she can’t give; that tortures him because he can’t find it within himself.  
  
Gently, she uncurls the fingers at her neck, allowing herself one last inhale against the full length of him before she slides down. She takes several steps back, careful to keep her voice steady as she idly touches the skin where his hand has been.  
  
“If memory serves, ’twas you that set the events of Ragnarok in motion with the banishment of our king, and you that saved what was left of Asgard by commandeering this ship. I’d say you’ve had a great deal of choice in the matter, your Highness,” she says softly.  
  
Fury rushes through him again, dark and bitter, but dissipates just as quickly. In its place, there’s an almost pathological curiosity, born from the sadness in her tone. The words tumble out of him before he can stop himself.  
  
“What choice was taken from you?”  
  
She looks up sharply, and he reads it in her gaze. The indignity of having to live a life of seconds amid immortals; the weight of counting time in decades rather than centuries. And more than that, a deeper wound, one that cuts uncomfortably close — the pain of not belonging.  
  
He opens his mouth to reply just as the bay doors swing open.  
  
“Brother!” Thor shouts, arms raised triumphantly. “We’ve been searching for you for nearly an hour! Korg told me your wager did not end well.”  
  
“I speared him in the chest,” Korg supplies helpfully.  
  
“I’m fine,” Loki says irritably. “And you’re interrupting.”  
  
“I was just leaving,” Lyra interjects, and Loki realizes she’s already made her way to the exit.  
  
“Your Highness,” she says, bowing to Thor, and then turns to Loki, avoiding his eyes as she dips her head.  
  
He wants to tell her that she need not bow — not to his oaf of a brother, and certainly not to him.  
  
But she’s already gone, a blur amid the crowd.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay. Next few chapters are written. Smut is coming...soon. Very soon.

Loki doesn’t think he’ll see her again.  
  
So when he does the next night, he’s caught entirely off guard.  
  
Especially since he’s disguised as Banner.  
  
“Bruce,” he hears from behind, and Loki looks up at the mirror in front of him to see the bespectacled face of the physicist staring back.  
  
He’d assumed the man’s form to tend bar in the ship’s makeshift lounge. It was a parlor trick he performed every now and again; a way to listen to local chatter and amuse himself on the interminably long voyage.  
  
Usually, he chose someone more conspicuous to impersonate — Heimdall, the Valkyrie, even Thor — if just for the fun of seeing their expressions when they walked in.  
  
Tonight, though, he’d chosen Banner for the man’s ability to induce terror-stricken silence among the guests.

All of Asgard had witnessed the damage the Hulk could do; few wanted to be the cause of his return.  And so they tiptoed around him, pleasing and thank-you’ing with unbearable civility as he poured their beers, all the while avoiding his gaze and any form of interaction.

That suited Loki just fine. It was easier to eavesdrop when you didn’t need to make conversation.  
  
Except for this _woman_. Smiling at him. Moving towards him. Close. Too close.

Before he can react, Loki feels the slide of warm hands around his arm and the soft press of Lyra’s cheek against his shoulder.  It’s a brief, affectionate hold — no more than a moment — but he's entirely unsettled by it.  
  
It’s…warm. Oddly familiar. The sort of affection he would have received as a child.  
  
The sort his mother used to give.  
  
He clears his throat, searching for the most Midgardian greeting he can think of, but she’s already sliding onto a stool, pointing to the well.  
  
“A double. Whatever you have.”  
  
Lyra slumps over the countertop; hair undone and falling from the loose braid at her nape, eyes sallow with fatigue. But she still manages a small smile when he slides a glass towards her.  
  
She downs it one, the column of her throat arching as she swallows, and Loki can’t help but follow the path of her tongue as she licks her lips and hisses at the burn of the strong drink.  
  
He pours her another, and her lips quirk. “Shouldn’t you be against this? As a doctor, I mean.”  
  
“Sometimes, what’s good for the soul is bad for the liver.”  
  
“Cheers to that.” She downs the second glass, frowning as she turns to regard him with a curious look. “This is Asgardian whiskey.”  
  
_Damn._ Loki forgot he’d tampered with the booze. He’d been sneaking a shot here and there, desperately needing to cut the acrid taste of the Sakkaran swill with something more familiar.  
  
“Is it?” he replies innocently.  
  
She turns the shot glass in her hand. “I haven’t tasted whiskey like that since — Gods, since…Ostara."

Loki pushes up Banner’s glasses, hoping he’s affecting an earnest expression of curiosity. "Our summer festival,” she clarifies. “It is — it was — a way to mark the change of seasons. Celebrate the summer harvest. People would dress up in costumes. There was great food and drink and…” Her voice trails off, expression shuttering.  
  
“And?” he prompts.  
  
She waves him off, smiling ruefully. “Getting caught up in silly memories, is all.”  
  
Loki leans in. “Come on. Think of this as a, uh —” _What had the human called it? — Ah, yes_. “…A safe space.”  
  
Lyra smiles, shaking her head. But a moment later, she’s leaning in, the warmth of the memory washing over her. “Strange what you take for granted. I had always detested those sorts of things — balls and festivals. They were really just marriage marketplaces, thinly disguised ones at that.”  
  
Loki smiles inwardly, recalling his own suffering at being forced to attend such pageantry.  
  
“I was always on the sidelines just watching. I didn’t look like what you were supposed to look like for the Summer Festival. Not tall or thin…certainly not wheat-blonde. But one year — one year I managed to find a costume. Even a wig to cover my hair. I found heels so high that I was nearly Thor’s height. They assumed I was one of the actors and pushed me out onto the stage when it came time for the big ceremony. Right into the middle of the court, in front of the Allfather and his family. It was…” Her voice softens. “The way they looked at me when I came out. Like I was this thing they actually believed in. Like I… _belonged_.”  
  
Something squeezes in his chest, recalling the all too familiar feeling of exclusion after he’d discovered the truth of his own origins.  
  
Lyra clears her throat. “Anyway. Never thought I’d taste whiskey from home again.”  
  
“Maybe some Asgardian bootlegger managed to sneak a few bottles aboard.”  
  
“Doubtful,” she replies. “What food and drink we had managed to bring up from the keep went flying over the Bifrost when Hela attacked. What her army didn’t destroy, Loki’s forces finished off.”  
  
_Oh._  
  
“Well,'" he scrambles. "Good thing that food and drink are easily replaceable.”  
  
“Easily,” she echoes.

Though her eyes are downcast, Loki reads the anger in them. And beneath that, a dull, resigned despair.  
  
He finds himself leaning in. “Lyra," he says softly. "What is it you lost on the bridge?"  
  
She smiles, but it doesn't reach her eyes. "My medicine," she says at length. "All of it."  
  
_Her blood regulator? Surely that was within Eir’s skill set to reproduce._ “Can’t your, uh — your healers make more?”  
  
She laughs softly. “And how would they do that with the Tree of Idun destroyed?”  
  
_What in Hel did she need Idun’s immortal apples for?_  
  
“My half-Aesir genes have granted me a few superhuman gifts,” she replies, as if reading his mind. “Immunity from most diseases; a strength weight-lifters would envy, but…” She swirls the whiskey in her glass. “Not much by way of longevity. The serum has helped prolong my mortal life. Unnaturally so. Without it…"  
  
“How long do you have?” It’s said bluntly, guilt and curiosity fueling his urgent compulsion to know.  
  
But she doesn’t appear bothered by the question. Probably, Loki realizes, because she thinks of it often herself.  
  
She leans back, eyes on him, and pulls up volumes of her riotous hair, exposing several thin, silver strands at her nape.“These just appeared last week. A year or two, if I'm being generous. Months, if not. Given I've outlived mortal lives by several hundred years, I'm well past my expiration date."  
  
“There must be a way,” Loki finds himself saying. “Surely, your scientists — ”  
  
“Bruce.” Her slim fingers slide over his, and it’s only when she touches him that he realizes his fists are clenched. “I don’t want to think about it. Please. For tonight, just pour?”  
  
So pour he does. Again and again, until her eyes start to glaze over and her mouth takes on a soft, lopsided grin, the memory of their earlier conversation fading.

Over the course of several hours, they speak of nothing and everything; galley gossip, the pain of inventory; who’s sleeping with who. As they talk, her hair becomes looser, curls fanning around her face, and Loki idly finds himself wondering if their texture is coarse or soft; if she would at all notice the knot of her braid untying itself, allowing him to take a closer look.  
  
She shoves herself up suddenly from the stool, dangling her glass in front of him.  “C’mon Banner. One more for the road.”  
  
“One more water, I think,” he replies, but she pushes him away, leaning over the countertop instead as she considers the bottles in the well. An extra button has come undone from her shirt, affording him a straight shot down her bra, and Loki catches a full eye of something lacy and thin encasing criminally soft, generous skin, and he looks up to realize that he’s not the only one who’s noticed. Several men have abandoned their conversation to stare openly at the woman draped over the faux-marble countertop.  
  
Loki finds himself a her side, blocking their view as he tugs her up. “I think it’s best we call it a night, don’t you?”  
  
“We’re just starting,” she protests, but allows him to lead her out nonetheless.  
  
They exit, Loki eating steps down the hall with long, fluid strides, eager to get her home as quickly as possible.  
  
“Hey,” she complains, rushing to keep up with his gait. “Dying mortal here. Gotta to walk slow.”  
  
“Not funny,” he says, and it’s really not. Except that each time she stumbles against him, she lets out a small, satisfied burp, and he can feel her laughter bubbling up from within, even through the layers of his glamour. She's soft and warm and supple and — _Gods,_ these hallways were as damnably long as the Bifrost.  
  
If he didn’t think she’d throw up on him, he would simply transport them. But as it is, Lyra can barely stand, and he’d rather not risk an unfortunate trip through space-time. Instead, he stops, searching the hallway. “Where are your rooms?”  
  
“Room,” she clarifies. “We can’t all be brooding princes and bombshell kings. ”  
  
"Or half-mortal nuisances," he grouses, dragging her down the hall. 

“Slow down," she mutters. "I’m no contender, y’know.”  
  
“I wouldn’t bet against you."  
  
Another hallway. He tugs her sharply. Left. Then right.  
  
After one particularly harsh pull, she wrests her arm free, rubbing her shoulder as she scowls. “You’re gonna pull out my arm!. I've only got two, you know!”  
  
“Will you _please_ just hurry up — ”  
  
“What the hell is going on?” Thor’s voice booms from behind him.  
  
“What the _hell_ is _going on_?” Banner’s voice echoes.  
  
Loki turns around slowly to see his brother eyeing him with a look of dark fury, while Banner’s staring at him with dumbfounded confusion, not quite sure he believes his eyes.  
  
“We had a deal,” Thor says.  
  
“What the _hell_...?” Banner says.

"Asgardians only," Thor adds.

"For _what?"_ Banner cries.  
  
Lyra’s head snaps between them like she’s watching a tennis match. “But you’re — and you’re…”

She turns to Loki. "And _you're...?"_  
  
Loki sighs irritably, and with a resigned look, shimmers back to himself, the glamour of the scientist giving way to the annoyed prince beneath.  
  
A moment of silence.  And then, a loud guffaw bursts out of Lyra. “It’s you!” she gasps. “Of _course_ it’s you.”  
  
“I — I didn’t know he could do that,” Banner exclaims.  
  
“He said he wouldn’t,” grunts Thor.  
  
“Can we do this later?” Loki says. He’s eager to escape the lengthy reprimand he’s sure his brother is already concocting, as well as the interminable questions Bruce will surely have on the physics of it all.  
  
And then, there’s the half-blood. Still laughing. Leaning in to him. Not at all bothered by the odd looks she’s receiving from the men. Thor’s eyes flit from Lyra to his brother, a question there, and before he's made to respond, Loki grasps her round the waist, mutters for her to hold on, and disappears.

In a blink, they're in her room.  
  
"Norns," Lyra swears, stomach churning. "You could've warned me."

She falls onto the bed, cool sheets meeting her fevered cheek. "Leave, please. Unless you want to conclude your bartending experience with an authentic cleanup."  
  
“Stop moving,” Loki chastises, kneeling by her nonetheless. An odd look crosses his features as he considers her. Then, without warning, his large hand splays softly across her stomach, and goosebumps erupt along Lyra's skin at the sensation. There's brief warmth, followed by a cool, minty energy that instantly calms her stomach.

If she weren't so inebriated, she'd have cause for embarrassment. As it is, she pats Loki's arm gratefully, eyes drifting shut as she rolls onto her side.

Loki does his best to ignore wide, shapely hips that squirm as they struggle to find a comfortable position, hair that sweeps against his shoulder every now and again, and _damn it all_ — a shirt that does little to contain ample breasts that threaten to spill out of their strict confines.  
  
_Leave. I need to leave._  
  
He stands hastily, ready to transport to his own rooms.  
  
Her voice drifts up from the bed. “I’m glad it was you.”  
  
He stops. “What?”  
  
“Banner.” She mumbles. “At first, he felt so…different. Not like my friend. Like…something else. And then when you…” her voice fades.  
  
She opens her mouth to say something. Thinks better of it.

Instead, her eyes open blearily, envy plain as she pins him with a luminous, semi-lucid gaze. “That’s your grandest trick of all, your Majesty,” she says softly. “In your life, you have always been able to choose the part you wish to play.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> getting closer...I swear.

It takes Lyra a few days to realize what’s happened.  
  
It begins innocuously enough. 

An Einherjar approaches her one morning when she’s taking inventory and asks directions to the mess. He thanks her, smiles broadly, and sketches a deep bow as he leaves.  
  
Lyra finds the gesture oddly excessive for so small an ask, but thinks nothing of it.  
  
The second time, it’s another Einherjar — a senior commander — _very easy on the eyes_ , she can’t help but note, who was wondering if she’d be so kind as to show him where the water stores were. When she leaves, he bows deeply and kisses her hand, his lips hovering over the line of her knuckles.  
  
There is a third man, and a fourth, and it’s only when Thor himself makes an excuse to speak to her concerning some banal inventory item that her suspicions flare, and she goes in search of a mirror.  
  
And nearly faints at the sight.   
  
_Asgardian trophy wife,_ is the first thought that springs to mind. She is at least a foot taller and several dress sizes smaller; a heart-shaped face of high cheekbones and large, cornflower blue eyes. Her wheat-blond hair is done up in a courtesan’s style; and she’s even dressed in the outlandish fashion that had swept the court this past season; all pleated silks and high waist and pert little breasts nearly spilling out of her top.  
  
Shock gives way to incredulity, and Lyra allows herself the briefest moment of indulgence as she twirls in front of the mirror. Idly, she wonders if her entire body has been transformed, and a quick lift of her skirts to expose a smooth stomach, curved hips and lean, long thighs confirms that yes, she is every inch an Osteran courtesan, dressed as a Spring Goddess for the mid-summer festival.  
  
Lyra grins devilishly. If only those fools of the court could see her now, parading through the halls of this alien ship in Asgard’s finest. She’d refuse every single one of them, if only for the satisfaction of watching them burn with rejection.  
  
She finds herself tracing her lips, the small, perfect bow so foreign to her own full mouth. Her fingers continue to skim: down over the delicate angles of her face, her long neck; across her smooth, porcelain collarbones and her thin, tapered waist. Her hands fall to the gentle flare of her slim hips — nothing like the wide, cumbersome things she has to normally ensure don’t accidentally knock into plants or tables whenever she strides through the halls — and it’s always strident, her step, always filled with some hard purpose; so unlike the delicate ones she now takes with her dainty, silken-slippered feet.  
  
This, should could get used to. This, she could see herself living in for days. Weeks. Perhaps even years. It could be a way to start over, whenever they land in their new home. Abandon her old self and carve a new life with —  
  
Fury, sharp and cold, leaps within her. It's only an artifice. A - a _glamour._   It’s not her. Never will be.  
  
Casting one last look at her enviable form, she throws a shawl around herself, covering up as much of her strange new form as possible, and takes off at a thunderous pace to find the source of this insufferable curse.  
  
——  
  
She finds him, of all places, in the mess hall. He even has the gall to leer as she comes striding across a field’s worth of soldiers, families, and children, all of whom look up from their meager rations to watch the royal courtesan with flashing eyes stalk towards the God of Mischief.  
  
Thor and Heimdall have the good sense to avert their eyes. Korg, however, looks on with unvarnished interest as Lyra stops in front of them.  
  
“Oh hi,” he says immediately. “My name’s Korg. You seem new. Have they told you about the revolution I’m starting? You're invited.”  
  
“Not now, Ko-Ko,” she mutters.  
  
“ _Ko-Ko_?” Loki repeats, affronted by the very thought that the talking rock should have a nickname. Lyra ignores him, eyes burning.“Your Highness. A word?”  
  
Loki finishes the fruit he’s been peeling before setting his knife down. He takes in the stares of the mess hall with all the pomp of a royal holding court — which, she supposes, he is.  “I find no reason we can’t speak here freely. These are, after all, your fellow countrymen, are they not?”  
  
Several soldiers eye her appreciatively, and it’s all she can do not to box his ears.  
  
“Good lady,” Thor says, casting his brother a look, completely oblivious to her identity. “I apologize on behalf of Loki for whatever slight he might have incurred against you. If there is any way I might recompense his actions — ”  
  
“That won’t be necessary,” Loki says, rising. Thor’s little speech has caused Lyra’s shoulders to sag in frustration, unintentionally drawing the room’s eyes to her chest, and he can see the growing rage in the gaze she levels at him. He doesn’t particularly care to suffer a throttling in front of all of Asgard — even one from a mere half-mortal  — and so he quickly ushers her out and into a quiet hallway.  
  
As soon as they’re alone, she spins on him, furious. “What have you done?”

It’s the first time he’s heard her voice close to anything like real despair, and he ignores the strange tightness in his chest.

He paints a smile onto his face, arms outstretched in mock surrender.  
  
“I thought only to give you what you've missed: Ostara. The costumes. The attention. _Belonging._ "  
  
She gives him a long, hard look through unnaturally bright eyes.  “Change me back.”  
  
“Are you — ”  
  
“Change me _back_ , Loki.”  
  
The sound of his name hits him with — well, it’s not exactly guilt — but something unpleasant enough that he flicks his fingers without hesitation, undoing the spell. Instantly, the glamour shimmers and dissipates, leaving nothing save the fury of the woman beneath it.

Lyra stumbles back, running her hands over herself, as if checking to see if she’s all there, and Loki watches the raw play of emotion across her face as she realizes she’s regained her true form. There is relief, but also disappointment, and something that looks a lot like regret.  
  
It’s only when she looks back up that he realizes the brightness in her eyes is not some effect of the artifice, but tears.  
  
She stares at him a beat, daring him to say something.  
  
When he doesn’t, she sneers, turns on her heel, and disappears.  
  



	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> T-minus one.

Lyra does not see the Trickster for days afterwards, and she is glad for it.  
  
There are countless tasks that need attending to aboard a refugee ship with meager stock. There is a filtration system that needs fixing; inventory to be taken; fuel that needs to be bought and bartered for.  
  
She plunges into her duties with ardor, and the encounter with the prince soon fades as she loses herself in the daily press of survival.  
  
One morning, she thinks she sees him in the healing wards, helping Eir, but when she pauses to look back, she sees only the healer’s handmaidens, their lithe, feminine forms standing at silent attention as they hover over patients.

She’s too far away to notice the one with green eyes, tracking her movements across the hall.  
  
By nightfall, she’s nearly comatose with exhaustion. There’d been a problem with the ore they’d tried to barter in exchange for fuel, and she’d spent hours poring through manifests, attempting to track down several missing tonnes. Matters were made worse by not only having to move the ore manually once it was found, but also having Miek and Korg help, which always meant it took twice as long and was half as done.  
  
Her shift blessedly finished, she stumbles into her quarters. She collapses onto the cot in her small room, shucking her shoes off and moaning at the feel of cool sheets beneath her chafed skin.

 _Oh, to never wake up,_ Lyra thinks, pressing her face to the bed. What she’d do for her bed back on Asgard…pillows far as they eye could see and sheets spun from the finest Vanir silk.  
  
As if reading her mind, a familiar voice floats to her from the dark. “If I’d known clean sheets would elicit such a response, I’d have locked you in the laundry room days ago.”  
  
“Go away," Lyra groand, her voice muffled. “I can’t do this now.”  
  
“Do what?”  
  
“Be witty. Engage in clever banter for your enjoyment. If it’s diversion you seek, Heimdall has set up a jousting match in the gym.”  
  
Loki emerges from the shadows, disdain plain in his tone. “And be speared by that rock again?”  
  
He props himself on her vanity, watching her shift tiredly on the bed. Lyra ignores him. She’s too tired to coax out what he’s unwilling to say. Whatever confession he’s come to give, he can make on his own.  
  
“I meant no harm,” he says at length.  
  
“Right. Just the Trickster, doing what he does.”  
  
“You enjoyed it. Admit it.”  
  
A long, frustrated sigh escapes her. “Did you ever pause to think,” she says, turning on her side to finally look at him, “what would happen after the glamour wore off?”  
  
“It was yours to keep for as long as you wanted.”  
  
“For as long as…” She sits up in disbelief. “I’m not a prince, Loki. I can’t assume guises without consequence. What would happen when my family came calling for me? Or friends?” She rolls out of bed, fire in her eyes. “Let’s say I managed to beguile everyone. Kept the glamour for years. Perhaps even speared myself a ‘nobleman’” — this is said with a sneer —  “someone of reputable caste. What would they say when I birthed something decidedly not immortal, assuming the man who fell for that form could be tricked indefinitely?”  
  
He shifts. “I hadn’t thought that far.”  
  
“Why would you? It was impulsiveness that put you on the throne, and a disguise that kept you there. All you traffic in is misdirection. I do not have that luxury.”  
  
He is silent for a long moment. Long enough that she has time to contemplate what reaction she’ll receive. His ire? His dismissal? His rage?  
  
She doesn’t expect him to move. But he’s suddenly in front of her, blocking the one escape route between the bed and the door as he looks down at her.

Like this, he’s even taller, and she has to lean back to get the full measure of him. His eyes roam her features, mouth thinned in contemplation as he gives her a thorough once-over.  
  
“You’re not terrible,” he concedes at length. “ As far as half-breeds go.”  
  
“ _How_ do they call you Silvertongue?!”  
  
He folds his arms, appraising her. “Your hair is ferocious, much like your spirit. It was the first thing I noticed as you lay sprawled in the medical bay. Your skin…” His gaze glides down her cheek, pausing at an old, faded scar near her ear. “Is not unmarred like some untried babe’s. You have history, and that is far more interesting.”  
  
“So glad to pass muster,” she mutters.  
  
He leans over, close enough so she can feel the heat of him, smell the bite of his leather. He takes a piece of her robe between his thumb and forefinger, rubbing the cloth thoughtfully. “This muslin is coarse as a grain sack, but your sheets are fine linen. You give your clothes away to those in need, and would just as soon give your bedding if it didn’t remind you so much of home.“  
  
Lyra swallows. _Is she so easy to read?_  
  
“And as for the rest…” His voice drops precipitously low.  “Would it pain you to know that some men, in their youthful exploits, discovered that their preferences lean towards the very attributes you abhor?”  
  
He leans in, the barest touch of his fingers against her forehead, but it hits her nonetheless like a thunder bolt to the brain: images, sounds, memories — _his_ memories — a young and less burdened version of himself; inexperienced, but altogether eager — pressed between curved thighs and hips, surging against lush breasts and voluptuous forms; not the waif-life courtesans of Asgard's courts, but real women: women who moaned and screamed and commanded power and surrender amid sweat-soaked sheets during endless nights of ecstatic exploits and dark fantasies she’d only ever heard of in drunken tales and perhaps had dreamt of on occasion or two, and beyond that, _Norns_ , she can _feel_ all of it: his desire, his want, his need, staring right at her as he watches her take it in.  
  
He lifts his hand from her face and Lyra gasps, mind reeling from what he's shown her.

And then he's there, mouth pressed to her ear as he delivers his last criminal thought. “Your body was made for loving, Lyra. A night in your arms would be a privilege, not a concession.”  
  
One last look, and he’s gone in a shimmer of green.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay. All aboard the porn train, amigos.

_Norns._   
  
Lyra lies in bed, staring up at the ceiling.   
  
It’s been a week, and Loki’s words still play on an unceasing loop in her mind. The heat of him had burned through her robes. She could smell his magic, buffeting against her like gales of a treacherous storm.   
  
He hadn’t been lying, but he also hadn’t offered to bed her.    
  
She supposed the question was still in the air.   
  
Lyra shifts, burrowing into the sheets grumpily. Perhaps he is avoiding her. Perhaps he feels as though he said too much. Perhaps — she shoves down a wave of bile — perhaps he’s regretted his impulsive flattery, and is doing his best to steer clear of any intended consequence.   
  
It’s been a week since Loki commandeered her narrow room and pushed his memories into her mind, the likes of which she’s still trying to process. A week since she’s woken up every morning, wet and yearning with a need she’d never thought possible, made all the more torturous by his disappearance.   
  
It’s been a week, and Lyra is done waiting.   
  
It takes some doing — a bit of charm and some not-very-subtle bribing of Heimdall (who told her he’d seen her coming), but she’s able to finagle the key code to the Mischief-Maker’s room.   
  
She waits until late evening, ensuring that the majority of the ship has retired. The King’s schedule, which always appears on the board outside his makeshift chambers, confirms another late-night security council meeting — one that the Trickster was no doubt attending.   
  
_This isn’t a break-in,_ Lyra thinks as she hastily taps the code in. Not really. But it’s the only time she knows he’s not in his chambers, and she’d rather not be caught off-guard the way she was last time. She wants to be prepared when she talks to the God of Mischief and Lies. Brace herself for whatever prank, glamor, or scheme she may find herself up against. And — if he happens to interpret her late-night visit as a charmingly spontaneous attempt at seduction,who is she to dissuade him?  
  
The door swishes open quietly, and Lyra darts in to a pitch-black room. It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust. The room is bigger than hers, but not by much; devoid of any personal trinkets, save the glint of a horned helmet on the nightstand.   
  
Her fingers barely flick upwards to engage the light panel when she feels herself shoved hard against the wall, pressed against the cold metal.  A hand covers her mouth, harsh and unyielding.   
  
“Do you have a death-wish, Half-Blood?” he snarls against her ear.   
  
Lyra hates that his voice lances through her, lodging itself low in her belly. They’re chest to back; his leather pressed against the soft muslin of her shirt; and Lyra stifles the urge to arch back into him. Instead, she turns her head slightly, affecting the driest tone possible. “Isn’t there some by-laws meeting you should be attending?”  
  
He pushes away, and is silent for a long moment.    
  
As the seconds tick by, Lyra starts to feel uneasy. Was he expecting someone? Had she interrupted something? Is he waiting for some sort of —  
  
“I am alone,” he says, as if reading her mind. “And wish to continue to be.”  
  
His voice warns her away, and she should heed it. But Lyra pushes through the inky blackness, fingers searching for a way to turn on the light. “I need to talk to you.”  
  
“Leave.”  
  
She can’t. She won’t find the nerve to come back if she does. “Please, let me just — ”  
  
 _“Leave.”_  
  
Undeterred, she waves her arms around, hoping for any flicker of light.  
  
“Lyra.” There’s admonishment in his tone, but something that also sounds like defeat.    
  
“What’s wrong?”  
  
Loki sighs. It would be so easy to feign some sort of illness; dismiss her with a well-crafted excuse. But even as he thinks it, he knows that her damnable need to care will out in the end. And that’s why, instead of pushing her away, he lets her find him in the dark. Lets her scrambling hands curl around his arm, finger pads skimming up over buckles and leather to find his face. He knows she feels it when her fingers freeze, discovering the truth he’s come to know and despise.    
  
Lyra inhales sharply. There are marks on his skin. Tribal. Ancient.   
  
Jotun.  
  
She exhales softly, voice dying on a question she won't ask because he won’t answer.   
  
The moment stretches into an interminable silence.

Loki jerks away, nerves aflame. This was a mistake.   
  
“Leave me.”  
  
“Loki — ”  
  
“Leave me!” A wave of frozen air shoves her against the door. Icy blackness curls around her wrists, forcing her palm against the keypad.   
  
“Let me see you!”  
  
Another blast, and she can’t feel her legs as cold shards wrap around her calves, pinning her; ice crystals forming at her mouth, nearly sealing it shut. She wets her lips, pushing out the words before his fury can silence her completely. “You put a glamour on me. One I did not ask for! Grant me this. One H-h-half-Blood to another.”  
  
There’s a moment of utter stillness. So complete she can’t hear him breathe.   
  
Then, Lyra feels the ice shatter as her legs give way and she collapses to the floor.   
  
Light, harsh and bright, suddenly floods her vision, and strong hands haul her up.  
  
Her clothes are soaked through with melted ice; hair wet and pressed against her damp skin, lips cracked from the cold and eyes blinking through what had moments ago been snow against her lashes.   
  
Even so, she feels inexplicable warmth as he brings his cobalt face down to hers.   
  
He smiles, but there’s no mirth in his crimson gaze.  
  
“You’ve seen the monster,” he growls. “Satisfied?”  
  
She studies him for a long moment. “Not yet.”  
  
And with that, she slides her mouth firmly against his. 


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay, all. Thanks for your patience. The porn-train express is back in service.

Shock is the first emotion that registers in Loki’s brain.  
  
There’s a soft, pliant mouth working against his own, and though it’s certainly not the first, it’s the only one to have ever encountered rough, blue skin instead of his normal hue.  
  
The second is lust. A pure, unbridled _want_ that springs from somewhere deep in his gut; more instinctive than he’s used to and debilitating in its all-consuming demand. She pushes against him, accursedly soft little tongue sliding against his mouth demanding access, and Norns be damned if he doesn’t give it to her.  
  
Lyra moans softly as she feels his chilled lips part, giving way to a surprisingly hot cavern that tastes faintly of some syrupy cocktail he’d been drinking and his own dark, unique flavor, laden with magic and something else she can’t place; something primal and ancient that makes her want to lay claim.  
  
Hands that had at first stiffened in shock against her relax. She feels long fingers dig into her hips, bunching her skirts up as they curl and press into her small waist, smoothing down and over the generous curve of her rear. His skin is slightly cooler to the touch, and he shudders when she traces the raised lines along his brow and cheek, her warm hands sending a surge of hot pleasure exploding across his skin.  
  
He growls approvingly, and filled with a sudden rush of boldness at his response, she tightens her arms around him, tongue eagerly tracing the sharp incisors she finds on either side of his mouth.  
  
He snaps back, breath low and ragged. “What are you doing?”  
  
She blinks, barely a moment to shake her head before he curses and shoves her against the wall, mouth crashing down in a brutal, punishing kiss.  
  
_Stupid creature,_ Loki grouses as he plunders her mouth. Stupid and infuriating and heedless and _Gods,_ he can _smell_ her: the hot blood that pumps through quickened veins;  the salt of sweat that drips down her delicious neck, and there, between her thighs, the intoxicating musk of her desire.  
  
She wants him. Like this. _Because_ of this.  
  
A much darker thought sweeps through him then, battering his already unmoored senses, urging him to break the boundaries of mere lust. To lull her into pleasure, make her feel safe. Then bind her, pin her down, and use her until her weak bones snap with the force of it, screams filled with terror as the monster overtakes her.

Lyra shudders beneath him, and it's only then that he realizes he's whispered his thoughts aloud.  
  
He draws back, thumb pressing against her swollen lips. Dark blue against flushed red.

“Afraid yet?” he asks softly.  
  
She shakes her head, but there’s no mistaking the trepidation in her eyes.  
  
“You should leave,” he says, tone gentle and laced with finality.  
  
Lyra watches him carefully, heart pounding. She knows she must end this. Take what’s been given and be grateful for the indulgence she’s been granted.  He could easily kill her in this form if he desired — had confessed as much — and she burns with the sharp sting of rejection in knowing that his want, no matter how powerful, would easily be discarded in the face of self-preservation.  
  
And yet.  
  
His thigh is pressed solidly between her legs, anchoring her to his lean form, his arms enfolding her even as they tighten around her writhing frame. _Like a snake wrapped around its prey,_ she thinks, eyeing his hooded expression.  
  
Does she wish to fight, or be swallowed whole?  
  
Fighting the knot of fear in her stomach, Lyra rolls her hips against him experimentally.  
  
And Loki groans.  
  
She is hot. And wet. He can feel it. It's rolling off of her warm, curvy form in treacherous waves.

And she’s looking up at him, eyes large and luminous, filled with need and something more. Something far more disconcerting that causes his gut to twist with anger and regret.  
  
He pushes up and away from her abruptly, gaze shuttering. 

“Strip.”  
  
“What?”  
  
Loki steps back, cool mask falling into place as he distances himself from the impossible woman that had moments ago ground herself wantonly against him, all the while gazing up at him with complete and utter trust.  
  
More than trust. _Sentiment._  
  
He can’t allow that. Won’t.  
  
So he straighten to his full height, hands clasped behind his back as his eyes flick over her dismissively.  
  
“Strip,” he repeats in a bored tone. “Or don’t you understand how this works?”  
  
There’s murder in her gaze, and his brow flicks up with mock amusement. “Don’t look at me like that. You’re the one who started this.”  
  
Confusion momentarily clouds her eyes, followed by embarrassment and rage.  
  
“I — I started this? You were the one who accosted me in the medical bay; who disguised yourself as another man I shared memories with; put a glamor on me I didn’t ask for as a result of those memories; and pushed your — your _fantasy_ reel into my head. What did I possibly do to precipitate this?!”  
  
His gaze flicks over her, expressionless.  “Do you want me to fuck you, or not?”  
  
Loki watches her flush even as she flinches, the crude words hitting their mark. Of _course_ she wants this. She’d told him as much for weeks as they'd circled one another; had practically offered it to him the night she’d been drunk. If she were any kind of self-preserving creature, she’d run while she can. Smack him back to his normal hue and storm out with her dignity — and body — still intact.  
  
Instead, the damnable woman actually reaches up to unbutton her shirt. Her skirts hastily follow, and the rest of her garments, until her curved, mouthwatering form is clad only in thin undergarments that reveal wide hips, a tantalizingly small waist, and ample breasts he'd feast on for days.

Her gaze flicks up to him for a moment. Self-conscious, she turns, fingers reaching up to slowly unhook the clasps of her bra.    
  
“I didn’t say you could turn.”  
  
Her head turns slightly, voice laced with frustration. “If this is the only way you can stand to do this, then get on with it. I am no stranger to pleasure devoid of emotion or intimacy. Only...don’t make me watch you use me. Please.”  
  
She feels more than hears his growl of frustration as he lunges for her. Cold leather meets bare skin and she yelps; unprepared as one hand shoves itself gruffly beneath her bra, wrenching the cloth down and off her shoulders as he squeezes her heavy breast, rough and punishing as he rubs over a taut nipple.  
  
“Don’t make you watch?” he snarls.  
  
Her nipple pebbles beneath his touch.She moans as he wrenches around, forcing her to face the full-length mirror across the room.  
  
“What is it that so disgusts you?” he growls against her ear, and Lyra can only look on helplessly at the images cast in dim light — a flushed, panting woman against a tall shadowed figure, her fingers digging into leather-clad thighs as a long, determined hand snakes beneath the waistband of thin cotton, to cup her aching, swollen flesh beneath.  
  
She whimpers, body bowing under the wicked play of his touch, arching and writhing against the liquid torment. His touch is electric; the cool, rough pads of his long fingers delving through silken, hot skin, every rasp a coarse little shock that hits straight at her core.  
  
Bright, crimson eyes meet hers in the mirror. “Tell me, Lyra.”  
  
“Please,” she whimpers. He pauses a moment, reading her expression, the faint ghost of a smile on his lips as he meets her eyes in the mirror and slides one long, tapered finger inside.    
  
_Gods._ She is tight, hot, and unbearably wet. He could almost come at the feel of her like this, her small, eager sheath eagerly pulsing around him.  
  
He slides in another finger, biting back a moan as she eagerly pulls him in towards her molten core, and cursing her irresistible form, the words escape him before he knows what he's saying. “Is this what you don’t want to see? How depraved the monster makes you? How _obscene_?”

And then, momentarily forgetting the game as he plunders her, half-wondrous, murmuring: “You’re absolutely soaked.”  
  
Fingers curl inside her, finding her deliciously soft and ripe as he begins to thrust gently. “Lyra. Look at yourself.”  
  
Lyra moans in protest, head pressed against his neck. She doesn’t want to see how much power he holds over her; how wet he makes her; how heedless of common sense and sanity. And yet he’s there, mouth against her ear as he nudges her, dark voice skittering across her inflamed skin.  
  
“Look,” he says, fingers slowing. “Or I’ll stop.”  
  
Reluctantly, she opens her eyes, and it’s only then that she realizes he’s seated them on the bed, long legs akimbo, her thighs spread wide over his knees. One hand is in his hair, wrapped tight around his neck to anchor his cool mouth at her fevered shoulder. Her other hand grips the arm snaked around her tightly, following its criminal movements as he works his fingers within her. Somehow, her underwear’s vanished, and she watches, transfixed, as absurdly long, blue fingers pump in and out, knuckles glistening with her dripping desire.  
  
She arches against him, thighs trembling.

“I’m —” she whimpers.  
  
“Shhh.” He knows she’s close. Can feel the fluttering squeeze of her hot sheath around his fingers and her small, fast pants against his neck.    
  
Beneath her, his cock is painfully hard, trapped beneath the confines of his leathers. Her deliciously round ass grinds against him, tormenting him with every move, and it takes every ounce of self-control in him not to flip her beneath him and bury himself to the hilt, riding her as she screams his name.

Instead, he quickens the pace, fingers thrusting deeply, reaching for her swollen core. Burying his knuckles to the hilt as he plunges in again and again, feeling her flutter around him.  
  
Her hands clamp around his arm suddenly, urgency in her voice. “N-not like this,” she moans, tugging at him helplessly. “Inside.”  
  
“Come for me,” he growls, thrusting relentlessly, fingers rubbing her core with lavish, sleek strokes. He feels the tension in her; the muscles bunching at her stomach and her back writhing helplessly as she strives to reach her peak.

He's not prepared she arches back, hand flailing at the waist of his pants as she reaches for him, one hand skittering across his leathers to cup him.  
  
“No,” he says harshly, yanking her hand away, pinning it back. His legs spread wider, fingers thrusting faster, deeper.  
  
His mouth is on her neck, sucking wetly at the tender chords of her neck. " _Come_ , Lyra."  
  
“No,” she begs, hips arching rhythmically as she pants into the darkness. “Want you, _you_ …”  
  
And she clamps around him suddenly, sobbing his name as her thighs open wide and she nearly arches off his lap as the shuddering waves overtake her, crashing and pulsing around him hard and fast and tight. Loki sinks his teeth into her neck, holding her there as she writhes, a hunter immobilizing its prey. She grinds herself against him helplessly, the feeling enough to make his cock jump as he presses himself into the curve of her ass, the friction too much to bear as he jerks against her and spills into the tight, heated confines of his damnable leathers.  
  
He pants into the darkness against her neck, waiting as she comes down. Feels her breath gradually slow; arms loosening around him as she slumps against him.

It’s a lulling sort of aftermath that empties his mind for a blissful moment; enough so that he’s not prepared when she turns, arranging herself on his lap. Her hands slide around his neck, sweat-soaked body pressing against his fully clad form.  
  
One hand reaches between them, snaking into the unlaced placket — _how did it unlace itself?_ — between his thighs.

Half-glazed eyes, soft but no less determined, meet his own. "I believe," she says softly, fingers curling around his still-hard length. “It's your turn.”


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More Porn, Pt 2. Pt 3, coming soon.

“No.”  
  
He’s staring at her, Lyra notes, with a dark gaze bordering on murderous. Beneath, he’s still hard, practically pulsing around her fingers. She shifts, sliding her hands further into his pants.  
  
“Surely, you —”  
  
She’s suddenly on her back, hands pinned above her head as his body looms over hers. Beneath dark locks, his eyes glitter with fury.  
  
_“Enough.”_  
  
“Let me touch you,” she whispers. “Please.”  
  
Loki closes his eyes, drawing in every ounce of patience he can muster. Normally, he’d be happy to comply with whatever fevered request a bedmate would make of him. He’d have her touch him, suck him, take him into her body, legs around his shoulders and cock pounding mercilessly into her before she could think.  
  
But this one…  
  
Loki opens his eyes. She’s gazing up at him again with that look. That damnable _trust_. He can smell her heady arousal; feel the quiver of need as he traces the dip of her waist down to the wide curve of her hip, her lush body arching beneath him impatiently.  
  
Idly, he wonders what he feels like to her: cold hands painting goosebumps onto her flesh; rough, upbraided skin that scores her with every touch.  
  
“You want a monster,” he levels at her accusingly.  
  
“I want you,” she replies.  
  
Loki curses inwardly. Her gaze on him is insufferably tender; a reminder of the gifts that had been slowly stripped away by time and paternal revelations and torture at the dark corners of the universe: of love; of comfort; of the ability to be touched without cruelty or guile. He’s not worthy of those things anymore; hasn’t been for a long time. Least not with her — she whose life now hangs in the balance because of him. Because of his craven need to play savior to all, and in doing so, rob the life of one he —  
  
_No_. He shoves down the thought. Her desire for him is _pitiful_. Her need for him cloying and overbearing.  
  
Crouching, he wraps his wrists around her ankles and hauls her down to the edge of the bed.  
  
She yelps in surprise, scrambling for purchase. “Loki, what —”  
  
Strong fingers dig into her hips. Hold her open to his hot, reproachful gaze. He means to punish her, Lyra realizes. Make her regret her desire for him.

Before she can voice a protest, he’s grasping her waist and pulling her to him as his head descends, licking into her swollen flesh as he devours her like ripe, wet fruit.  
  
_Sweet Valhalla._ Lyra gasps at the feel of his hot, skilled mouth against her, tongue bold and obscene as it plunges into her depths, memorizing every contour. He’s everywhere at once: kissing, licking, tasting, sucking, and she nearly faints when his lips wrap around her swollen center, pulling it into his mouth as he laves at her with punishing strokes.  
  
Hands sink into his hair, clutching his head as her hips grind helplessly against his face, and she gasps as his fingers find her again, teasing her entrance and sliding back inside with a lazy thrust. Her body recognizes him instantly, molding and tightening around his fingers, and even Loki can’t disguise his moan at her unbridled desire.  
  
She’s sweet, musky and positively _dripping_. He could take her so easily like this, cock pushing into her with a smooth claim. He’d fuck her until she broke her with the force of it, body and mind and soul.  
  
But he can’t. He’s already taken too much. So he angles his fingers inside her just so, and feels her clamp down as she trembles towards sharp release.  
  
Lyra moans helplessly, body clamping around him. It’s too much. The rasp of his tongue against her slick flesh; the wicked rhythm of his fingers thrusting inside her. She feels her thighs shake, inner walls quivering as they rocket towards bliss.  
  
“N-no,” she protests, squirming against him.  
  
In response, his eyes flick up, just long enough for her to watch him hook her knees over his shoulders.  
  
There’s alarm in her voice as she straightens more fully, attempting to push him away.  “No,” she whimpers. “Inside. W-want you inside.”  
  
Loki ignores her, focusing instead on the tight, wet pulse of her around his fingers; the swollen throb of her in his mouth, the soft little moans that send bolts of desire racing through his painfully hard cock.  
  
“Come,” he commands darkly, but she resists, pushing against the hands locked around her hips with fierce determination. She doesn’t want to come like this. Not without him in her. She can see the jut of thick flesh between his trousers rubbing against the sheets, impossibly hard and eager, begging for release, and her body pulses at the thought of taking him inside her.    
  
“Come,” he commands again, harsh and demanding. She’s trembling with the force of resisting; thighs quivering as she clamps down stubbornly. Two fingers plunge into her soaked depths in punishment, probing and curving as they find the soft spot within her, lavishly rubbing as his mouth wraps around her center ruthlessly.  
  
She sobs in defeat, feeling her orgasm rushing towards her with urgent, pulsing need. “Loki, pl — ”  
  
And her protest is lost on a scream as pleasure wracks her, her body arching against his harsh grip as her thighs quake around his head and she pulses with sobbing relief around the cruel drive of his fingers and mouth.  
  
He licks her through orgasm, slow and persistent. Continues even as she comes down, tongue heavy against her sensitized flesh.  
  
She tugs at his hair. “No more,” she protests hoarsely. “Hurts.”  
  
He ignores her, and Lyra feels herself being dragged up and over, thighs falling on either side of his head as Loki moves beneath her, hands bracketing her hips like steel bands.  
  
“What are you doing?"

He looks up at her briefly, just long enough for her to catch a vindictive, wicked flash in his crimson gaze before he brings her down against his mouth yet again, pace unrelenting against her still-shuddering flesh.  
  
Lyra cries out in protest as she twitches above him, discomfort lancing through her with ever swipe of his tongue. She’s barely recovered from her first orgasm, her body overstimulated, raw, unable to stand the slightest touch.  
  
But he persists, his strokes switching between gentle and harsh; coaxing and demanding, until she's panting above him again, body reluctantly rocketing towards a sharp, unwanted release. Her womb clenches painfully; body teetering on the brink, and Loki counts the rapid beat of her heart against her pulsing clit before he buries his tongue inside her and makes her scream.  
  
Lyra doesn't know how long it goes on. Only that she sinks into a mindless sensation then, thoughts empty and drifting as he forces orgasm after orgasm from her aching flesh, all sensation narrowed down to the heat of his tongue and the brute rasp of his fingers inside her.  
  
At one point, she fades. She must. Because when she comes to, she's lying next to him, limp and lifeless, belly against the sheets and unable to do anything but breathe. There's a voice in her hear, velvet baritone soft and coaxing. "It's alright, Lyra. Come on back, darling."

Slowly, her eyes open. His hand is still buried between her legs, fingers idly stroking her sensitive flesh. Her sweat-soaked body still twitches with the last throes of orgasm, and it's only when she shifts, protesting softly, that he relents and withdraws his hand.  
  
Lyra sighs. She’s sore and numb and limp, and there’s nothing more she wants to do than to sleep, allowing her abused body some much-needed rest.

Instinctively, she curls against him, back to his side.

Deep male satisfaction fills Loki as he watches her eyes drift close. He knows he’s been unnecessarily cruel, pushing her body to its limits. But pleasuring her to exhaustion had been the only way to avoid bedding her, and he relaxes into the ensuing silence that permeates as her breaths deepen.  
  
He’s unaware of her eyes on him as he at last brings his fingers to his mouth, sucking in her divine flavor. Growing even harder as he thinks how incredibly wet she is for him; _because_ of him.  
  
He's unprepared when her voice drifts up from behind him, soft with curiosity. “You touch me, yet refuse to bed me.”  
  
Loki turns irritably, half a mind to use his seidr on her to induce a comatose sleep, when he suddenly finds himself robbed of breath.   
  
Her hand has managed to snake between them and she's _there,_ tracing the etched ridges of his cock with delicate endeavor. He growls, revulsion and lust surging through him as her nimble fingers round the blue head of his engorged length, her thumb twirling across his pulsing tip.  
  
“What is it about _no,_ ” he growls, flipping her beneath him once again. “That you don’t understand?”  
  
He pins her down with one hand, the other snaking down between her still-damp thighs.  
  
“No!” she yelps, clamping her legs shut. She pins him with a furious gaze. “Stop it. _Talk_ to me. Tell me why you won't bed me.”  
  
He traces the gentle slope of her abdomen, averting his eyes. “Do you so desperately wish for a monster to defile you?”  
  
To his surprise, she chuckles. “You’ve already defiled me, trickster. In multiple ways. What’s one more?” And then, because she realizes he’s serious, her voice grows soft with conviction. "You’re no monster to me.”  
  
“Even though,” he says, finally meeting her eyes. “I’ve sentenced you to die?”


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm a terrible trash bear with trash deadlines. The porn train is officially rolling into the station and has reached the end of the line. Hope you've enjoyed the ride.

Ah. So that was it. It wasn’t his form that bothered him.   
  
He’d blamed himself for the loss of her medicine.   
  
Her life.   
  
Lyra resolutely pushes him back, smoothing a finger down his stubborn brow. “All the more reason to make me feel alive, don’t you think?”  
  
She shifts, the heat of her thighs burning against his painfully erect sex, and Loki growls, rocking so that she’s pressed against him, his hands digging painfully into the supple flesh at her hips.   
  
“ _Damnable woman_ ,” he grinds out. “Don’t you understand? I will _break_ you in this form.” Despite her bravado, she’d shaken beneath his touch; had come apart from his mouth and fingers alone, her overeager body tight and unready. He won’t risk hurting her, especially —   
  
“You won’t break me,” she says softly, pupils blown wide. “Though I’d love to see you try.”  
  
It takes a moment for her words to sink in.   
  
Then, he’s on her, growling as he pins her down, thighs thrusting between her hips, angling for purchase.   
  
“Clothing off,” she pants, scrambling at his leathers, and he vanishes his clothing in an instant, every inch of his cool flesh searching for the searing warmth of hers.  
  
She leans over him, breasts tortuously grazing his chest as her large, curious eyes rove his fully naked form. He tracks her carefully, part of him appalled that he’s laid bare like this; awaiting a judgment that surely must come as she absorbs his vile form. But it never does.   
  
Instead, she slowly hitches forward to latch onto his neck, and Lyra swears she hears a soft purr escape when her lips meet soft azure. She teases the strained cords with her teeth, tracing a line down to the hard crest of his collarbone and shoulders until he’s groaning softly, the upraised sigils across his chest rising as he undulates beneath her.   
  
She marks his flesh with slow, suctioning kisses, relishing his small sighs, and when she passes over the scar tissue on his chest, delights in the unexpected gasp that tumbles out as the dull flesh comes alive beneath her warm tongue, aflame and wickedly sensitive to every caress.   
  
His nipples are dark; almost a midnight black, and Lyra swipes over a pebbled tip, enjoying his sharp inhale as she alternates between small nips of her teeth and soothing rolls of her tongue.  
  
Long, cobalt fingers slip into her hair, gathering the tresses as her head dips lower.   
  
_Gods, when had he last been touched like this?_ Loki wonders, gasping. Attended to — no, _worshipped_ — with such awareness, such utter focus…  
  
Then her tongue slides over his cock, and his brain short-circuits.   
  
_“Fuck.”_  
  
Hot, wet heat. Curling around him with burning curiosity, each swipe a molten blaze that threatens to sear him alive. He’s too big to take much of, so she contents herself with suckling his head, tracing the markings that circle his length with a delicate, eager touch, until he’s thrusting shallowly into her mouth, gasping wordlessly as he feels his world tilt on its axis.  
  
“Lyra — ”  
  
She feels him swell, only relenting when he tugs her up sharply, hands fisting her hair as he slides from her mouth in a messy glide.  
  
“You’re trying to kill me,” he rasps.  
  
“Hardly.” She wraps her hand around his glistening length. “What good would this be to me, then?”  
  
“Ever the pragmatist,” he relents, and yanks her back up so that she’s straddling him once again.   
  
She wraps her arms around his neck, rocking against him experimentally, and they both moan at the delicious friction of his textured length against her slick, swollen wetness.    
  
He searches for the angle to take him home, pushing at the scalding heat in between her thighs, and she looks down at him through half-glazed eyes, hips poised tantalizingly above him.   
  
“Slow,” she whispers.  
  
He stills. The pull of her eyes, that godforsaken _trust_ , stirring a sudden, urgent question that leaps out of his mouth before he can stop it. “Why?”  
  
Lyra blinks. “Isn’t it fairly obvious? I won’t break, but I certainly need time to — ”  
  
 _“Insufferable creature,”_   he grinds out, vitriol pitching his voice so low that she can barely hear him. His carnelian eyes flash, rage and self-loathing roaring within them. “Why do you desire this when I’ve sentenced you to _die_?”  
  
She traces the hard, defiant line of his mouth. “Well…you’re rather magnificent in blue.”  
  
 _“Lyra.”_  
  
She sighs, head thunking against his chest in frustration. “By the Gods, what would you like me to say? You’re irresistibly charming, despite your misguided attempts at sowing chaos. Witnessing your cavalier schemes can be rather thrilling when one isn’t a victim.”  
  
“Damned with faint praise,” he deadpans.  
  
Her fingers trail along his cheek, tracing their foreign markings. “You’re _you_ , Loki. Selfish and arrogant and ceaselessly opportunistic. But…” Her gaze softens. “You don’t pretend towards some sort of inherent good. You don’t try to convince others of your moral rightness. You are…true to yourself. That makes you more honest and trustworthy than anyone I know.”  
  
Well, that’s… _unsettling._  
  
Loki has long prided himself on his mercurial nature; mischief and chaos his universal constants; a deflective weaponry to ward against the cruel indifference of a cold universe. That she thinks his trickery solid; something to be trusted…well, he can’t even begin to wrap his mind around that.   
  
_Especially_ when she’s wrapped around him, and _most especially_ when she’s pushing down onto him, the blessed, slick heat of her finally settling itself onto his straining cock, her hips wriggling with a delicious swivel as she bears down and —   
  
_Sweet Valhalla._   
  
Liquid heat. Molten and soaked and unbearably tight. Stretching around him with eager reluctance. Nails grip at his back, and Loki fists her hair wildly, breath ragged against her ear as blessed relief washes through him so thoroughly that he nearly misses the small, surprised “oh” that escapes her.   
  
He grits his teeth, eyes narrow as he draws back to look at her. “Oh, _what_?”  
  
Lyra shifts. It wasn’t that he was going to break her, exactly; it was more like he might not even be able to try.   
  
He’s impossibly thick. Every raised sigil a sharp rasp against her swollen flesh, every inch a bruising intrusion, and even though she’s practically dripping for him, it’s not enough. She dips her head back so that he can’t read her discomfort. _Perhaps this isn’t the right angle. Perhaps it would work better if —_  
  
And then he leans forward with a muttered curse and closes his mouth over an aching nipple.   
  
_Gods._ Lightning across her flesh, each rough swipe of his tongue shooting an electric bolt of pleasure from her breasts straight to her core. His mouth is hot and punishing as he hungrily suckles her, teeth harshly scraping against her sensitive skin until she’s whimpering from the sweet torture of it, and when he pushes up again, he’s greeted by a cascade of wetness that lets him slip in one more torturous inch.  
  
 _By the godforsaken Norns,_ he grimaces. Why did he have to lust after a half-blooded mortal?  
  
The languid whirl of her hips is an inescapable torture; every push and stroke heightened by the delectable feel of her voluptuous form and the soft, low cries of pleasure against his neck. Already, she’s fluttering around him, barely the half of him inside her, and Loki grits his teeth as she rises up, nearly sliding him out of her completely before she bears down once again.  
  
Lyra gasps, pulsing around him unexpectedly. “You’re going to make me come.”  
  
“That is…the general…idea,” he grinds out, and stiffens as she suddenly clutches him, breaths quickening to a sharp whine as she abruptly arches, her orgasm taking them both by surprise as she pulses around him in short, rapid strokes, her unrelenting tightness squeezing him like a vice until he’s gasping for breath.  
  
“Loki,” she slumps against him, sighing contentedly as she gently flutters around him. “‘Good.”  
  
“That,” he says through clenched teeth. “Was not even a bloody _start_.”  
  
No response.   
  
He digs his fingers into her hips, desperate. “You need to move.”  
  
“Can’t,” she mumbles against his neck, and Loki curses, exasperated as he rolls them over, her teeth grazing his Adam’s apple encouragingly as she wraps her legs around his waist.

“Go on,” she whispers.  
  
Though he can feel the primal rush deep within him; the need to conquer and lay claim with stunning brutality, he’s mindful that she can still break, despite her assurances to the contrary.   
  
So against all instinct, Loki fists her hair as he leans above her, mindful not to crush her half-mortal form as he slowly, carefully, pushes into her.  
  
“Gods, Loki," she whimpers, canting her hips against his aching length. "More."  
  
And he wants more, desperately wants more, but she’s so unbearably tight and her little cries against his skin, muffled though she makes them, tell him that she can’t. He has half a mind to ask her if she’s done this before, or if he’s actually bedding an untouched woman, but then she’s suddenly arching and flexing beneath him, as if her body suddenly remembers how to do this, and her sheath is ripening and molding around him with blessed relief and he drives deeper, sinking towards her molten core.  
  
Lyra gasps, digging her nails into his shoulders, feeling him stretch her as he pushes deep. He withdraws; thrusts again. A slow, unhurried slide until he’s nearly at her womb, and she cries out and arches when he finally slides home, the blunt head of him pushing at her swollen cervix.   
  
“Fuck,” she pants.  
  
“Yes,” he growls, and gritting his teeth, sets a slow and methodical rhythm that’s designed to make her lose her mind.  Lyra arches, a sharp moan escaping. He’s impossibly big and deep, and deep, and _deep_ , and _Gods,_ she can feel herself already shuddering around him again, the delicious rasp of his cock hurtling her towards a stuttering release.   
  
“Gods, yes — Loki, _please_ …”  
  
“Come for me,” he growls, pleasure chasing up his spine, pouring through his limbs.  
  
“With you,” she whimpers, dark, desperate eyes pinning him. She cants up, meeting him thrust for thrust, and he hitches her thighs up until they’re hugging his ribs, the thick column of his cock burying himself inside her with slow, pummeling strokes.  
  
She gasps when he hits her womb; the heavy, pounding weight of him battering overripe flesh, over and over again until it’s a dull, pleasurable throb, and she lets out a strangled sob when she feels him speed up, thrusts increasingly fast and harsh as he begins to swell.  
  
“Come with me.” His voice low, guttural, eyes locked on hers as his cock pounds into her with unrelenting speed, the man stripped away to make way for the baser form that aches to lay claim. His velvet, harsh baritone is at her ear, whispering entreaties and threats, enough so that her body trembles with each command, overcome by sound and feel and taste as he sinks his teeth into her neck, fingers sliding between them to her swollen clit — 

_"Gods!"_ She’s gone, head thrown back on a silent scream as Lyra arches, frozen, clamping around him with unrelenting tightness as she comes apart in his arms.  
  
Loki moans, release shuttling down his spine and cock as he comes at last, cursing darkly as her slick depths tighten around him, milking him as he spills into her with eager, thick spurts. She sobs against his neck, tightening her arms and legs around him as she feels him kiss her womb with every thrust.   
  
He fucks her through orgasm, setting a languid rhythm that’s torturous to her oversensitive flesh, and when she begs him to stop, he merely pulls her astride him, coaxing her spent body to ride him until it ripples and clamps around him again despite her thin protests; and when he feels himself swell, he rolls them over so he can drive into her from behind, watching in satisfaction as the thick, blue column disappears into her unbearable tightness, cock glistening white with her arousal and his release, her cries buried in the sheets and her trembling limbs falling to the bed as he pulses into her with slow, possessive strokes.   
  
He takes her again, once against the wall, cool metal digging into her back with nothing but his harsh thrusts to hold her up; and again, bent over the desk, thrusting so deeply that her toes scrabble off the floor and the table dents the wall; and again, spread against him, back to chest as he forces her to watch him fuck her in the mirror, legs spread absurdly wide as the broad piston of his cock pounds into her, his release streaking her thighs and dripping onto the floor between them.  
  
“Loki,” she whimpers, his name a plea, a prayer, an endless supplication.  
  
“Yes, Lyra, yes, darling,” he murmurs, her name a ragged, echoing response.   
  
—————————  
  
It’s not until much later,  when Lyra is lying limp and boneless against the sheets, still twitching and barely able to remember her own name, that a thought occurs to her.  
  
“Why were you blue tonight?”  
  
Loki’s working lazy circles on her back, preoccupied by tracing the delicious curve of her ass. “Mm?”  
  
“Tonight,” Lyra says, her voice hoarse as she turns to look back at him. “Why were you in this form?”  
  
He looks away, jaw tightening, and she follows his gaze to the garbage bin, where dozens of metal pieces lie broken and dismembered. Pieces that look a lot like the blood tester she’d first seen him use in the medical bay.   
  
Her fingers drift over his arm, noticing for the first time dozens of puncture holes.   
  
“Oh, Loki.” Her heart squeezes.   
  
Though his gaze shutters, she feels his quiet rage. He loathes that he has no answers; that this accursed ship yields no better pathway for him. He loathes the idea of going back to Midgard and subjecting himself to whatever torture that will entail. But most of all, he hates how soft her eyes are on him; how filled with knowing.  
  
“I won’t have your pity,” he snarls.  
  
Lyra chuckles, shaking her head with a mixture of irritation and affection. She turns to him, eyes bright and clear. “Be patient, Loki. You have centuries yet to search for a home.There is time yet to find a place where you belong.”  
  
He’s silent for a long moment. Enough so that she wonders if he’s fallen asleep. He startles her when he bends to the crook of her neck, inhaling her scent, the thought that’s been swirling in his mind finally coalescing, finding a voice.   
  
“What if you did?”  
  
“Did what?”  
  
“Have time.”   
  
Her smiles fades. She sits up, eyeing him carefully. “Are you serious?”  
  
His dips his fingers along her hip, traces her spine. “Asgard no longer maintains a monopoly on immortality. There are other places. Other objects beyond Idun’s apples.”   
  
They both watch his hand play across her hip. Cool azure across warm flesh. The tableau entirely normal, the gesture entirely right. As if his hand knows that it belongs there.   
  
“Lyra.” Crimson eyes meet hers. “What if there was more?”  
  
She smiles, kissing him softly. “OK, Mischief-Maker. I’ll bite. What if there was?”


End file.
